SPD extends Halliburton E&P services in Siberia

March 24, 2009
Salym Petroleum Development, a JV of Shell and Sibir Energy, has signed a contract extension with Halliburton for E&P services in the Khanty-Mansi autonomous district of western Siberia.

Eric Watkins
OGJ Oil Diplomacy Editor

LOS ANGELES, Mar. 24 -- Salym Petroleum Development (SPD), a joint venture of Royal Dutch Shell PLC and Sibir Energy, has signed a contract extension with Halliburton for exploration and production services in the Khanty-Mansi autonomous district of western Siberia.

The 4-year contract, valued at $100 million, calls for the provision of directional-drilling, measurement-while-drilling, and logging-while-drilling along with drilling fluids and cementing services, SPD said.

The new wells to be drilled, to an average depth of 2,600 m, include 400 S-shaped wells, plus directional and extended-reach wells, said SPD, which produces oil at West Salym, Upper Salym, and Vadelyp fields.

Earlier this month, SPD also awarded Schlumberger Wireline a 3-year extension contract for provision of wireline logging services in Salym oil fields, located 120 km southwest of Surgut and 30 km west of Salym village.

The awards coincide with statements by Chris Finlayson, Shell's Russian chairman, that SPD has no plans to reduce its output target or cut capital expenditures this year.

Speaking at an industry conference in Moscow, Finlayson said that "in essence" SPD's investment plans will remain unchanged this year, although he did not provide SPD's estimated capital expenditures for 2009.

SPD is expecting to produce 150,000 b/d of oil in 2009-10 in line with earlier forecasts, according to Finlayson, despite lower oil prices and weaker demand.

SPD said it produced more than 126,000 b/d of oil in 2008, a 50% increase over 2007. In January, output reached 150,000 b/d—a plateau the company hopes to maintain, said Finlayson.

Contact Eric Watkins at [email protected].